My Windows 11 Wishlist

[LAwLz]

Since Windows 11 is soon to be announced, and we have already gotten some glimpses of it in the form of a leaked build, I thought I'd write a list of things I would like to see in Windows 11, and maybe people can add their own things and ideas to it.

 

 

1) Make a consistent UI across the entire OS and product range. Windows 10 is a mess. Things like in this picture, should not be acceptable:

Spoiler

The problem so far has been that Microsoft keeps adding new designs on top of the old ones. Old designs haven't gotten updated and instead they have just gone "okay, from now on our new stuff will look like this". I am afraid that the same thing will happen with Windows 11. That instead of this screenshot with design elements from 4 different Windows versions, we will get screenshots with design elements from 5 different Windows versions.

 

2) Tabs in File Explorer, or at the very least a split view mode. 

 

3) Enable the use of files other than JPEG as background images. For those of you unaware, Windows do not support the use of any file format other than JPEG files as your background. If you click on a PNG file and selects "use as background", then Windows convers your image into a JPEG file, put it into the folder "%appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Themes" as the file "TranscodedWallpaper". Microsoft's transcoder is quite bad however, so you will get better results by manually transcoding your PNG file in for example Photoshop at 100% quality, and then replacing the TranscodedWallpaper file with your own. That should not be necessary. My computer has 8 cores and 32GB of RAM. I think it can handle an 8MB PNG file...

 

4) Let me uninstall everything. If I don't want "Get Help" then I should be able to uninstall it. If I don't want the "Camera" app then I should be able to uninstall it. The list goes on.

 

5) Let me sync settings, all settings, across devices if I sign in with a Microsoft account.

 

6) Allow us to install individual updates. Updates shouldn't be an all-or-nothing type of deal. You can hide the option if you want, just give users some way of dealing with it.

 

7) Allow users to completely disabled telemetry. If I don't want to constantly send Microsoft data about exactly what I am doing on my PC then I shouldn't have it. 

 

8 ) Let us specify which audio inputs and outputs a program should use. Might be confusing to some users, but it would be neat if programs didn't have to build in this capability themselves.

Edit: Already exists as pointed out by AdKeyz.

 

9) Make updates not require a restart. This is possible. It's difficult, but I am sure Microsoft can figure it out. Microsoft have dramatically improved the situation compared to let's say Windows XP, but there is still a long way to go. Even if they aren't able to fully get rid of restarts, there is still plenty of room for improvement in regards to how often restarts are required, and how long it takes to install updates.

 

10) Improve the built in VPN client. Add support for always-on VPN and support for more protocols (like Wireguard and DTLS). It's annoying having to install a third party VPN client because the built in one barely supports anything.

 

11) Keep the start button on the left. I am not against change, as you can clearly tell because I am asking for a lot of changes. I am against bad changes that goes against well established and functional design practices.

 

12) Add the option to use other file systems. NTFS is ass. F2FS, Btrfs, ZFS and/or EXT4 should be supported in Windows. Not only would we be able to get better features in Windows, it could also improve performance dramatically.

 

13) Give us an option for a "minimal install" when we first install Windows. The minimal install would only have the vital things that makes the OS work, and then we we could load different modules for additional features. This is how for example Ubuntu does it, and it works really well. 

 

14) No more ads in the OS. No pre-installed apps like Candy Crush, no "suggestions" to use paid Microsoft services, no "rekommendations" to install some app that Microsoft were paid to promise, no "reminders" to use features like Cortana. Nothing of the sorts. I shouldn't have to go in and disable like 6 different options in the OS, spread-out over multiple menus, just to not get bombarded with ads.

 

15) Support for Android apps. This is already rumored but I'd like to see it.

 

16) Better file format support out of the box. I shouldn't have to download and install things like RAW-image support, HEIF support, AV1 support, VP9 etc. I understand that the formats that cost Microsoft money aren't included, such as HEVC, but why aren't all free formats supported out of the box?

 

17) Allow me to get rid of Bing in Windows. I don't want to have to rename system files to make it so that pressing F1 doesn't automatically open a bing search for "get help with file explorer in Windows 10".

 

18) A proper package manager. Winget seemed nice at first, but the more I read about it the more I realize that it is not a proper package manager. It's yet another Microsoft product where they heard people wanted one thing, and then give them something half-baked that kind of does what people wanted but not really.

 

19) Make Windows search actually work decently. It is amazing how poorly the search function works and how well third party tools like Everything does it.

 

20) Support NIC-teaming in the consumer versions of Windows.

 

21) Simplify the different Editions of Windows. We don't need Home, Pro, Workstation, Education, Enterprise, S, 10X, N, etc. Just make one version and then at install enable/disable certain features depending on if it gets installed as a "home device" or an "enterprise device". 

 

22) (From Stahlmann) Fix the HDR implementation.

On 6/18/2021 at 12:06 PM, Stahlmann said:

Fix the HDR implementation. Currently enabling HDR will make contrast and colors look extremely bad in anything SDR. So atm the workaround is to only enable it when you're using an HDR app, then disabling it again. My suggestion would be to include a system that let's you just add an app to the "HDR list", which should tell Windows then to automatically enable/disable HDR when launching/closing said app.

  

23) Better support for multiple languages. I want Windows to be in English, but I want my keyboard layout to be Swedish. Not too difficult and Windows manages it fairly well. However, I also sometimes want to type in Japanese, so I want Windows to be in English, and my keyboards to switch between Swedish and Japanese. On top of that, I often want my spell checking to be done in both English and Swedish, so that when I type on this forum in English it gets spell checked for English, but when I type an email in let's say Outlook I want it to be spell checked in Swedish. This breaks all the goddamn time in Windows 10. It's also the reason why my Store app is a mix of 3 different languages. It sucks. It really shouldn't be that difficult to fix. The problem is that programs, even Microsoft's own program, constantly checks the system language and changes things depending on that. Just because my system language is English does not mean I want everything such as spell checking to only be English. It's even worse because some programs like Outlook will automatically "fix" Swedish words I write into  English words. 

 

24) The ability to lock a folder and then unlock it with Windows Hello. This should be doable if they implement a way to do per-file encryption with Bitlocker, or at the very least the ability to create encrypted containers like in Truecrypt/Veracrypt.

[avg123]

i think its just windows 10 with a different taskbar and a few ui tweaks. it wont be a major change from the current version of windows 10 

[Guest]

Windows 11 according to the leaks is a basically a bootleg clone of MacOS

[WereCat]

I'll be happy when they learn to make a square/rectangle because you can see the desktop in some spots when you put windows beside each other as they are not even.... 

 

[BetteBalterZen]

Honestly, I'm fine with how everything is already. The new look of Windows 11 is welcome. I just hope for better gaming performance haha - even though only a few %, I'd love to see performance improvements. 

[Stahlmann]

20 minutes ago, BetteBalterZen said:

Honestly, I'm fine with how everything is already. The new look of Windows 11 is welcome. I just hope for better gaming performance haha - even though only a few %, I'd love to see performance improvements. 

Don't get your hopes up high. There was no real difference in gaming performance for quite a few Windows iterations. I'd say Windows 10 is as close as it gets to unlocking your full hardware potential.

[BetteBalterZen]

1 minute ago, Stahlmann said:

Don't get your hopes up high. There was no real difference in gaming performance for quite a few Windows iterations. I'd say Windows 10 is as close as it gets to unlocking your full hardware potential.

Yup yup, I agree :)) 

[Stahlmann]

Nice list. I'd add one main concern i have with current Windows 10:

 

Fix the HDR implementation. Currently enabling HDR will make contrast and colors look extremely bad in anything SDR. So atm the workaround is to only enable it when you're using an HDR app, then disabling it again. My suggestion would be to include a system that let's you just add an app to the "HDR list", which should tell Windows then to automatically enable/disable HDR when launching/closing said app.

[Stahlmann]

50 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

19) Make Windows search actually work decently. It is amazing how poorly the search function works and how well third party tools like Everything does it.

Currently windows search is heavily dependant on your desktop. If the app you're searching is present on your desktop, it will quickly and reliably find it, but anything not present on your desktop won't be found most of the time until you spell out the full app name. Idk why microsoft still hasn't fixed that...

[AdKeyz]

5 hours ago, LAwLz said:

8 ) Let us specify which audio inputs and outputs a program should use. Might be confusing to some users, but it would be neat if programs didn't have to build in this capability themselves.

You can already do this in Windows 10. Settings > System > Sound > Advanced Sound Options.

 

[GoodBytes]

On 6/18/2021 at 6:53 PM, DzulfiqarZahranS said:

My wish list on win 11 is an option to stop charging at 80%

You can have this. But this isn't a OS ability. You need a driver that communicates with the charging circuit of the laptop. There is no standard for this. So you have to see if your laptop OEM wonderful utilities has this option and you have to use that.

 

Some devices uses better/different batteries which don't degrade if above 80%, beside the normal natural battery wear which occurs the moment the battery is produced. Lithium Ion battery is a name of a big group of different types of batteries. Tesla Lithium Ion battery isn't the same as your laptop. Also, you have the laptop power delivery. Cheap laptops tend to always draw power from the battery, and the power charges the battery. Others have fancier circuit design which can switch and draw additional power from the battery if the power adapter is unable to deliver the required power. 

 

So all to say, even if you have that option, it might not help your case. But I am not against it. A standard would be nice, and probably force OEMs to stop making terrible power circuits in laptops as well.

 

[ACEHACK]

24)  all the options/settings should be in ONE PLACE.  get rid of the damn ancient control panel, gpedit, and fix the damn settings app.  

25) cut the legacy unsupported crap from the kernel.  win 11 should not have IE, 16bit support, dos, and all the other ancient dead weight in the source code.

26) kill cmd and make poweshell, and linux shells the default. wsl2 should  be enabled by default in pro versions, and the terminal app should be preinstalled.  

27) stop reseting my settings after every update.  

28) show me actual useful info with verbose mode on for bsod.   

29) whats the point of system restore point when half the time it doesnt work. 

[GoodBytes]

15 hours ago, ACEHACK said:

24)  all the options/settings should be in ONE PLACE.  get rid of the damn ancient control panel, gpedit, and fix the damn settings app.  

I fully agree. 

 

Quote

25) cut the legacy unsupported crap from the kernel.  win 11 should not have IE, 16bit support, dos, and all the other ancient dead weight in the source code.

Yeaa.. I don't think that will happen. Essentially, Microsoft has 2 consumers groups. Consumers and enterprise. Many small businesses run Windows home or Pro, but with super expensive (for them) legacy software for their cash register system (an example). They can't upgrade them due to the cost (and sometimes they require some new receipt printer and whatnot, so another additional cost). Heck, people on this forum, do complain about some relatively old game that they still play, who want to still be able to play them. 

 

I am SURE, internally, Windows devs would LOVE to drop the legacy stuff. I mean, imagine every security bug you are attempting to fix, is not only a good fix needs to be done, but it also doesn't break old stuff either... and what if a legacy feature relied on what wasn't known to be a security issue at the time. You can't just remove it or disable it. The app needs to continue to work. You probably have to code lots of workaround and passthrough with checks... a huge headache. Oh, and keep in mind the code maintainability. Not fun that is for sure. One must really have a passion to work on such team fixing this.

 

Quote

26) kill cmd and make poweshell, and linux shells the default. wsl2 should  be enabled by default in pro versions, and the terminal app should be preinstalled.  

No. WSL actually has a performance degradation on systems when it has been enabled. WSL1: performance drops when it is running. WSL2: has a performance drop for being enabled and makes a greater impact when it is running. Not huge, like your system won't pass from this Ryzen 5900X down to a Core 2 Duo, of course not. But it does impact performance enough to notice a gaming performance drop (of course, the impact will depend on your system specs).

 

Windows Terminal as default command prompt you say....

 

So, your wish is coming true

I don't expect it will be the default though. Probably Microsoft will try to be sure it has no issue with Windows Terminal (and it will also depend on Windows Terminal developement progress), but maybe, the following version will. But in the meantime, you will be able to change the default.

 

Quote

27) stop reseting my settings after every update.  

It should not reset. Do you have any specifics?

 

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28) show me actual useful info with verbose mode on for bsod.   

Seems fairly complete to me, beside a mini dump overview viewer built-in into the OS. That would be nice. Fetch with ease the BSOD error code, and system or driver file faulting (if not hardware related).

You do have a QR code to jump you to Microsoft docs on the BSOD.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/debugger/bug-check-code-reference2

 

Maybe people who search on the web on their BSOD error, people should stop clicking on those generated titles on sites:

"[SOLVED] BSOD....."

"How to fix...."

etc.

and, instead, click on the actual documentation, it would show up higher up in page results.

 

 

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29) whats the point of system restore point when half the time it doesnt work. 

Works fine. Assuming it is enabled, it will work.

They are 2 common problems that break this:

• Malware is now smarter than a couple of years ago, and corrupt or remove restore points.
• Most defrag utilities out there aren't System Restore Point aware, and tend to move thing trying to defrag the differential bits of Restore Points, and corrupts everything. Use Windows defrag utilities, and disable and clear Restore Point before defragging, and enable it back (and make a new restore point manually) once done, or use Windows defrag utility (or get an SSD, where you don't need to defrag the system anymore).

 

[Forbidden Wafer]

Expose charging/battery wear/battery consumption information.

 

Let me install stuff from the store using command line (and no, I don't mean winget).

 

Intercept and replace all CEF stuff with Edge to reduce memory overhead.

 

.app application packaging.

 

Sandbox all the things (except for manually added exceptions when development mode is being used).

[Somerandomtechyboi]

3 words, windows 7 ftw! xDDDDD

 

yea windows 10 just sucks ass unless you somehow get it to not bsod at all (in my case), if you manage to have a w10 install that never bsods then its ok ish but honestly the bloatware just sucks.

 

No one cares about the privacy aspect of telemetry anyways, all the tech giants will always track you for instance google, only reason to get rid of telemetry for most is to improve performance, if you say you care about privacy but prefer (not need) to use google or any big tech companies then you are an idiot

 

If you actually care about privacy then stay as far away from these big tech companies as possible, i use duckduckgo as my search engine, and ill be using tutanota as my email for anything that doesnt require a google account.

 

I definitley hate the inconsistent ui of w10, the annoying bugs and glitches like the freaking sign in screen not showing even after 5 min (fix by ctrl + alt + del), all the crapware and telemetry, the fact that it runs like crap on low end hardware without being debloated, the garbage settings menu that seems to be aimed at mobile, microsoft selecting all of the telemetry options as enabled when you are intalling w10 and even fucking changing those settings when theres and update sometimes, etc.

 

^^^ this is why i hate w10 with a passion and prefer calling it crapdows 10, windows 7 and linux ftw!

 

Even worse im pretty sure w11 will still have atleast 90% of the things i absolutely dispise about w10 so im not gonna consider downgrading unless its a custom version thats been debloated.

 

And if it isnt apparent already i hate w10 with a passion.

[GoodBytes]

3 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

yea windows 10 just sucks ass unless you somehow get it to not bsod at all (in my case), if you manage to have a w10 install that never bsods then its ok ish but honestly the bloatware just sucks.

BSODs mean hardware or serious driver failure. You should look into that.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

1 minute ago, GoodBytes said:

BSODs mean hardware or serious driver failure. You should look into that.

I guess im just a part of the lucky few that has had no bsods whatsoever on w10

[cooky560]

The only time I've ever seen a windows 10 BSOD was a hardware error, a 4790k on an old second system no longer able to maintain it's overclock. The BSOD told me that cpu was no longer stable at those settings (not a bad life span overall though!) and now it serves as a media server, with all clocks at default. So thank you windows 10 for that. My main rig has never -touch wood- seen a bsod

[Mark Kaine]

On 6/18/2021 at 12:09 PM, Stahlmann said:

Currently windows search is heavily dependant on your desktop. If the app you're searching is present on your desktop, it will quickly and reliably find it, but anything not present on your desktop won't be found most of the time until you spell out the full app name. Idk why microsoft still hasn't fixed that...

search is about the only thing that works perfectly on windows 10 for me.

I just tested that on 500GB SSD (for my own confirmation) "tekk" finds all "Tekken 7" files/folders within seconds, "tiger" finds all "big.file.update.XXX.tiger.files" within seconds, on 1TB SSHD "native" finds all "native_PC" folders within seconds (or at least most of them, i have thousands… tbf)

*

 

And finding an "app"?  Split second…

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

 

Maybe im misunderstanding what you're saying, but search is incredibly fast on win 10 imo, if you type parts of what you're  looking for correctly (it wont work well with 1-3 letters, naturally, way too many files, but even that is reasonably fast, if there arent to many files) 

 

*none of these files or folders are on my "desktop"

[Forbidden Wafer]

14 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

search is about the only thing that works perfectly on windows 10 for me.

I guess you're one of the lucky ones. Search is complete trash in my experience.

 

You type exactly what you want, sometimes the name of a program, and it will still fail to match. 

 

Worst, if you think it will find what you want and hit enter, it will just launch stupid bing search.

 

It's insane that thing can't use prediction to find most frequently accessed files/programs instantly, just like every single browsers does.

[GoodBytes]

2 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

search is about the only thing that works perfectly on windows 10 for me.

I just tested that on 500GB SSD (for my own confirmation) "tekk" finds all "Tekken 7" files/folders within seconds, "tiger" finds all "big.file.update.XXX.tiger.files" within seconds, on 1TB SSHD "native" finds all "native_PC" folders within seconds (or at least most of them, i have thousands… tbf*)

 

 

And finding an "app"?  Split second…

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

 

Maybe im misunderstanding what you're saying, but search is incredibly fast on win 10 imo, if you type parts of what you're  looking for correctly (it wont work well with 1-3 letters, naturally, way too many files, but even that is reasonably fast, if there arent to many files) 

 

*none of these files are on my "desktop"

It works great for the majority of people. The problem is when the application shortcut or file isn't in Index area. Microsoft added a Global Index feature under Settings > Search which can be enabled. It isn't by default due to the performance degradation it will entail as now it needs to index everything.

 

Many people have files outside of Documents and such personal directories, or the application/game isn't in the Start menu. Or they installed something which disabled the Search service of Windows... maybe one of those "Optimize for gaming" or "Optimize PC" settings in some tweak tool (or they disabled the service themselves). Consider also registry edits instead of the service, also. Maybe disabled there. 

 

I won't deny that it has happened that the indexing bork, but typically rebuilding the index from the Search Settings panel, fixes this problem (won't be fix the moment you hit the rebuild button, as the system needs to, well, rebuild the index.. takes time).

[Alan G]

3 hours ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

I guess im just a part of the lucky few that has had no bsods whatsoever on w10

I suspect that you and I are part of a huge population that have never seen a BSOD.  I've run Win 10 on five builds now and each has performed flawlessly.

[Forbidden Wafer]

Haven't seen BSODs for a long time... Because the insider program has GSODs instead xD 

 

Now seriously, WSLv1 in the last previous builds has been a disaster. Crashing very frequently when killing processes forcefully.

 

 

[Mark Kaine]

24 minutes ago, GoodBytes said:

It works great for the majority of people. The problem is when the application shortcut or file isn't in Index area. Microsoft added a Global Index feature under Settings > Search which can be enabled. It isn't by default due to the performance degradation it will entail as now it needs to index everything.

 

Many people have files outside of Documents and such personal directories, or the application/game isn't in the Start menu. Or they installed something which disabled the Search service of Windows... maybe one of those "Optimize for gaming" or "Optimize PC" settings in some tweak tool (or they disabled the service themselves). Consider also registry edits instead of the service, also. Maybe disabled there. 

My windows is pretty heavily modified, but the two things i definitely didnt touch is search index  (pretty sure that was enabled, even if not, it *is* enabled for all drives, etc) and pagefile (even though i have a standby list cleaner that helps with that, maybe)

 

But… I didnt mention it because i didnt think it matters much, but generally the "cortana search" thing will only find certain things like you said in "documents" for example, it doesnt find most things that arent on the OS drive… BUT, thats the thing, I already know i need to use "search" on the correct  drive, thats about the only limitation though, it will find the stuff, and fast.

 

So when people say search is broken and they mean the Cortana thing, i guess they have a point, its at least not fully functional.

 

 

Its almost like two different things, one is "desktop" (or "OS") search, the other is "drive" search, and that at least  works flawlessly in my experience. (with the limitation of only one drive at a time, which surely could be improved)

 

PS: it also does work in "my PC" but thats slow as hell compared to search on each drive separately. (just tried, really slow, oof)

 

[flibberdipper]

Man I don't care about anything other than point number 3 in that list. It annoys me to no end having to do registry edits to keep Windows from completely murdering wallpapers.

 

Though it would also be nice if File History was a bit less fucky. I ended up upgrading from 2004 to 21H1 today to try fixing the error below (since it was a known issue with 2004 and I've just been putting off dealing with it), but nah. Still here. Might just end up manually deleting all the shit in the File History directory and starting over, but that involves me not being lazy and putting that off too.